Making Numbers Count: The art and science of communicating numbers - Softcover

Heath, Chip; Starr, Karla

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1787634221 ISBN 13: 9781787634220

Publisher: Bantam Press, 2022

Synopsis

A lively, practical, first-of-its-kind guide to understanding cold, clinical data and harnessing it to tell a persuasive story.
__________

How many hours' worth of songs are on your Spotify Wrapped this year?
How much is your commute time really worth?
How do you work out how likely you are to get Covid based on the official statistics?
How do your viewing hours track against the most popular shows on Netflix?

Whether you're interested in global problems like climate change, running a business, or just grasping how few people have washed their hands between visiting the bathroom and touching you, this book will help math-lovers and math-haters alike translate the numbers that illuminate our world.

Until very recently, most languages had no words for numbers greater than five - anything from six to infinity was known as 'lots'. While the numbers in our world have become increasingly complex, our brains are stuck in the past. Yet the ability to communicate and understand numbers has never mattered more. How can we more effectively translate numbers and stats - so fundamental to the next big idea - to make data come to life?

Drawing on years of research into making ideas stick, Chip Heath and Karla Starr outline six critical principles that will give anyone the tools to communicate numbers with more transparency and meaning. Using concepts such as simplicity, concreteness and familiarity, they show us how to transform hard numbers into their most engaging form, allowing us to bring more data, more naturally, into decisions in our schools, our workplaces and our society.

About this title

About the Author

Chip Heath (Author)
Chip Heath is a professor at Stanford Graduate School of Business. Chip and his brother, Dan, have written four New York Times bestselling books: Made to Stick, Switch, Decisive and The Power of Moments. He has helped over 530 start-ups refine and articulate their strategy and mission. Chip lives in California.

Karla Starr (Author)
Karla Starr has written for O The Oprah Magazine, The Atlantic, Slate, Popular Science, the Guardian and the LA Times. She has appeared on CBS Sunday Morning. She is the author of Can You Learn to Be Lucky? and lives in Portland, Oregon.

From the Back Cover

Whether you're interested in global problems like climate change, running a business, or just grasping how few people have washed their hands between visiting the bathroom and touching you, this book will help math-lovers and math-haters alike translate the numbers that illuminate our world.

Until very recently, most languages had no words for numbers greater than five - anything from six to infinity was known as 'lots'. While the numbers in our world have become increasingly complex, our brains are stuck in the past. Yet the ability to communicate and understand numbers has never mattered more. How can we more effectively translate numbers and stats - so fundamental to the next big idea - to make data come to life?

Drawing on years of research into making ideas stick, Chip Heath and Karla Starr outline six critical principles that will give anyone the tools to communicate numbers with more transparency and meaning. Using concepts such as simplicity, concreteness and familiarity, they show us how to transform hard numbers into their most engaging form, allowing us to bring more data, more naturally, into decisions in our schools, our workplaces and our society.

Edition details

• Publisher: Bantam Press
• Publication date: 2022
• ISBN 10: 1787634221
• ISBN 13: 9781787634220
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 192